Let me start by saying that IMO Baen has gone to shit since Jim's death in 06 R.I.P
Editing quality has gone way down, (here is a hint F7 is spell check on Word on a PC) and the physical product is also lower.
Now all publishers seem to have been putting out lower physical quality books, but they seem to be worse. Just my view.
With that out of the way, I think a lot of what was going on in the bar was deliberately done to get their (Baen's) name out there in the world. With the attitude of there is no such thing as bad publicity. A lot of SF / Fantasy writers got their 1st book published with them and then stuck with them for that reason. With Amazon / Kindle self published books being here now a lot of new writers are going there and not even looking at Bean. Not saying that there are not making money, or doing well but I have seen comments from a few writers who are essentially saying that they self published on AMZN because they could, never even thought about Bean.
So did they push then envelope to get some press and the envelope pushed back?
Did some other writers (who may be making them big $) complain?
There is also option "C" that the bar was a cost sink and this is an easy excuse to close it.
We can only speculate, but I think that they were allowing some things that were supposed to be 100% opposite of the "big liberal Amazon" and it did not work as indented.
Jim was a visionary and I really don't think that the last 14 years have been kind to his legacy, not in terms of things like this, but just what books and the quality Bean has been putting out.
-Dave
Topic: baen's bar (Read 62 times)
writer jason sanford wrote this piece on the message board for the publisher baen books called baen's bar:
Baen Books Forum Being Used to Advocate for Political Violence
more from file 770:
source: Pixel Scroll 2/15/21 A Hit! A Palpatine Hit!
while the article cites its closure, here's a link with regard to that as well: http://file770.com/weisskopf-announces-hiatus-for-baens-bar/
Baen Books Forum Being Used to Advocate for Political Violence
more from file 770:
Quote
Some of the users advocating violence are even site moderators.
While stating that he does not believe Baen Books endorses the calls for violence hosted on its forum, Sanford has questions he’d like Baen publisher Toni Weisskopf to be asked when she is the guest of honor at Worldcon this year.
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A moderator with the username Theoryman wrote, “As I’ve already pointed out, rendering ANY large city is uninhabitable is quite easy… And the Left lives in cities. The question is just how many of its inhabitants will survive…” Theoryman later in the thread suggested shooting transformers in cities with high-power rifles to make the cities “uninhabitable until restored,” adding in another post that “The point is to kill enough of them that they can not arise for another 50 years… or more.” …
[T]his user is a moderator for Baen’s Bar, meaning the publishing company selected this user to monitor and manage discussions on their forum.While stating that he does not believe Baen Books endorses the calls for violence hosted on its forum, Sanford has questions he’d like Baen publisher Toni Weisskopf to be asked when she is the guest of honor at Worldcon this year.
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During this year’s interview I’d really like Weisskopf to be asked about her company’s private forum being used to advocate for political violence. Does she find this acceptable? Does she condone these types of statements? Why did Baen Books previously ban some topics from their forum but doesn’t currently ban advocacy of political violence?
source: Pixel Scroll 2/15/21 A Hit! A Palpatine Hit!
while the article cites its closure, here's a link with regard to that as well: http://file770.com/weisskopf-announces-hiatus-for-baens-bar/
Quote
It’s been brought to my attention by some helpful folks that speech not everyone agrees with, and that may have become unlawful speech, has occurred on Baen’s Bar. In order to fully investigate those serious allegations, and any violations of the Bar “no hitting” rule, we will be taking a break from the Bar as of noon February 16th, and encourage all our readers to enjoy their lawful conversations elsewhere for the time being.—Toni Weisskopf, Publisher
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